General election: Former Labour home secretary rants about ‘disaster’ Corbyn after heavy defeat

Former home secretary Alan Johnson has launched a brutal attack on Jeremy Corbyn, claiming the Labour leader “couldn’t lead the working class out of a paper bag”.

The former Labour MP, who served as a cabinet minister under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, said Mr Corbyn was “a disaster on the doorstep” as Labour braced for its worst election result in almost 100 years.

The exit poll suggested that the party is on course to win just 191 seats – the fewest it has won in any general election since 1935.

In an angry tirade against the Labour leadership, Mr Johnson also told the pro-Corbyn Momentum group to get “out of the party” and “go back to your student politics”.

Mr Johnson was appearing on ITV News alongside Jon Lansman, the founder of Momentum and a key ally of Mr Corbyn.

He said: “I don’t live in London, I live in Yorkshire, I live in a working class constituency. I’ve known Jon for many years – Jon’s been around from the Bennite days. I’m afraid the working classes have always been a big disappointed for Jon and his cult.

“Corbyn was a disaster on the doorstep. Everyone knew that he couldn’t lead the working class out of a paper bag. Now Jon’s developed this Momentum group, this party within a party, aiming to keep the purity, the culture of betrayal goes on.

“You’ll hear it more and more now over the next couple of days as this little cult get their act together. I want them out of the party. I want Momentum gone. Go back to your student politics and your little left wing...”

Mr Johnson said the forecast of a significant House of Commons majority for the Conservatives was “the most disastrous result for the Labour Party”.

As Mr Corbyn came under huge pressure to resign, allies of the Labour leader claimed the party had suffered from divisions over Brexit.

Laura Parker, Momentum’s national co-ordinator, said: “Obviously we need to wait for the full results but it looks like Brexit dominated.

“It’s unquestionable that Labour’s policies are popular. Every poll shows it, and there is absolutely no appetite to go back to the centrist policies of old.

“But in this election we were squeezed by Brexit and it was the defining issue. Against that storm we built a huge movement of hundreds of thousands of ordinary people and they won’t stop until we see real change in this country.”